Inheriting the Wind
by SummersonMars
Summary: Against the wishes of her fundamentalist Christian parents, 11-year-old Mackenzie Campbell runs away from home to take her rightful place among the next class of Hogwarts students, and discovers a deeply buried secret that could change her and her siblings' lives forever. Rated T for course language and mentions of child abuse. No Canon/OC pairings.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:** This has been sitting on my computer taking up space for long enough. Let's see what kind of reception it gets.

**Do not message me to tell me that not all Christians are like this.** **I'm aware.** There's a reason why the word "fundamentalist" is in the summary.

**Disclaimer: **_Harry Potter_ and everything that went into it belongs to J. K. Rowling. Everything else belongs to me.

* * *

Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Campbell of Little Missenden were very happy to admit that they and their family were perfect, thank you very much. They weren't normal by the standards of regular society, but regular society was made up of misguided miscreants who had little idea of the paradise that they were willfully throwing away in favor of eternal damnation. So they hardly had any desire to be considered what those people considered to be "normal". Besides, they didn't need to be like everyone else. They were perfectly happy with their perfect little life. Joseph was an American whose family had moved to England when his father had received something that he called godly insight. Like his father, he grew up to be a carpenter. Not only that, but he had his own business. He had even built the house that he and his family lived in with his own two hands; the ultimate example of his worth as a man, in his opinion. His devoted wife, Lisa, was the seventh child of one of the few proper (in Joseph's mind) Christian families living in the British Isles. She had strayed from the flock when she was a young child and spent her teenage years living with her heathen aunt and attending a secular boarding school. But happily, she realized the err of her ways, prayed fervently for God's forgiveness, and gave up her old life entirely to answer her true calling. She became the model example of a godly woman; a warm, obedient woman who cooked, cleaned, and cared for her children with a smile on her face.

And they had many children. Shortly after they married at 18 years old, the Lord saw it fit to bless them with a baby girl that they named Mary. They were 38 now, and He had seen it fit to bless them with an additional 16 children. Mary eventually left the fold; lost to worldly ideals. But they still had 16 potential soldiers that He had given them to train up. One damned soul was not a very big loss.

The morning of July 1st, 2017 started off like any other summer morning in the Campbell household. The whole house rose at the crack of dawn. Joseph and his eldest sons, Michael and Matthew, went off to work while his wife and other 14 children started their morning chores. As there were so many children in the household, the four girls over the age of 10 were assigned younger siblings to look after. If they had a buddy that was too young to reliably do their chores, they were responsible for them. Next came breakfast. That day's breakfast was a massive scrambled egg, cheese, bacon, sausage, and kipper casserole that Martha, the eldest Campbell daughter after Mary, had helped her mother cook the night before. After breakfast was cleared away by the girls, the house chores began. While the Campbells were rich in spirit, they were what one would consider to be very poor by worldly standards. To help save money on groceries, they kept chickens and a vegetable garden. While only the girls fed the chickens and collected their eggs, everyone worked under the hot July sun picking weeds, watering, and removing pests from the rows of potatoes, peppers, lettuce, tomatoes, onions, and various herbs that they had planted in the half acre surrounding their house. This went on until lunch, when Margaret, the next eldest Campbell daughter, helped her mother make sandwiches. After another round of cleaning up, school began for all of the children under the age of 14. The Campbells never took a break from schooling during the summer. The children taught themselves using books and courses that Joseph had acquired from several homeschooling groups in the United States. They all learned the three Rs and what Joseph commonly referred to as 'character training', while the girls all learned basic household tasks such as making a budget and preserving canned goods. The little ones were taught by their buddies, of course. Lisa did not help much that day; she claimed that her nausea from the baby was really bad.

At around 5 pm, Joseph, Michael, and Matthew returned home, carrying the day's mail with them. Three of the youngest children, Madison, Moses, and Madeline, who had been playing near the front door at the time, froze and stared up at their father. Lisa tittered, still all smiles, and pulled them away with the help of her elder daughters. They were young. They would eventually learn that their father was tired from working for them and that they needed to know when to get out of his way and let him get to having the rest that he deserved. He was supposed to be second to God in their lives, after all.

After the swarm of children was cleared away, Joseph sat down in his favorite arm chair (that only he was allowed to sit in) in the living room and asked if dinner had been started yet. Lisa answered in the affirmative; Martha was working on some fish pies with Modesty and little Moira. (Not that Moira could help much; she was only 7 months old and had just mastered crawling and sitting still.) He grunted in appreciation, turned the radio on the end table next to the chair on (to the gospel station, of course), and went to work skimming through the pile of envelopes on his lap.

About halfway through the pile, after a couple of notices to Lisa from the welfare department, an electric bill, a very threatening letter from the BBC stating that they had not paid for a television license, (something Joseph had no intention of doing,) and a newsletter from their church, Joseph came across a very unusual letter. Instead of in a white envelope, the letter was concealed in brown parchment and stamped shut with a red wax seal bearing a coat of arms that Joseph had never seen before. Written on the back in emerald green ink was the most unusual return address he had ever seen.

_Office of Admissions  
Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry  
Somewhere in the United Kingdom_

Joseph didn't ponder for very long about how exactly he was supposed to return the letter if he needed to. Instead, he flipped it over to the front. His face and ears grew red hot when he saw who the letter was addressed to.

_Ms. Mackenzie Campbell  
The Left Bottom Bunk in the 3rd Bedroom on the 2nd Floor  
7 Mop End Lane  
Little Missenden  
Buckinghamshire_

"LISA!" Joseph's voice thundered throughout the entire house. Martha and Modesty stopped cooking, all of the children immediately went silent, and Lisa's Glasgow-like smile twitched slightly. "BRING MACKENZIE DOWN HERE RIGHT NOW!"


	2. Chapter 2

Mackenzie Campbell, as far as her parents were concerned, was the spawn of Satan. She lived to defy the Lord and her father; always trying to get into trouble and bring herself closer to damnation. She had spent all of July 1st in her bedroom, still smarting from the switching she had received the night before and being forced to copy as much of the Bible as she could manage before dinner, the only meal she was allowed to have that day, was ready.

Why was she punished? She wouldn't do Mathias's laundry for him.

It wasn't an unreasonable request. Mathias was 13, he was more than old enough to put his clothes in one of the washers, pour some detergent into it, and press the start button. She had done it herself hundreds of times and she was two years younger than him. Heck, Myra and Mara were eight and they had been doing their own laundry for at least a year. They even used the washboard and bucket a few times when the machines were taken. But her father would hear none of that.

"'I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence'," he had said in-between switchings with his thick American southern drawl. 1 Timothy 2:12; Mackenzie knew that that was the verse he was quoting because he said it whenever she talked back to him or her brothers, and had more than once made her copy it for hours on end. "Your duty to God is to serve me, your brothers, and your future husband. When you are told to do something, you shut your mouth and obey." He gave her six more rounds of switching until the thin tree branch flew out of his hand. (And it was always a thin tree branch, one that he always had imported from the United States. Mackenzie once heard him talk about how English trees just didn't compare to Georgian trees when it came to making proper switches.) Then he resorted to using his hand. But that didn't hurt nearly as much, especially since she always managed to dull the pain.

That was another thing that he didn't like: All of the odd 'satanic' things that she could do. She couldn't really control them. They just happened whenever she was upset or angry. She had even told her father such. But he just switched her some more for lying to him. Obviously, she didn't bother trying to explain it anymore. She just let it happen. It made the beatings a bit more tolerable, and he learned to give up when the switch left his hand since it would just keep happening if he went to pick it up. Such incidents, Mackenzie quickly learned, were a battle of attrition: Either she whimpered and cried, or he gave up and sent her to her room. She never whimpered or cried once the switch started flying.

She could hear him yelling from her room. "Let me guess: He had a bad day at work and he needs someone to take it out on," she grumbled. Shortly after, Mackenzie heard footsteps coming up the stairs and slowly approaching her room. She turned around in her chair and waited, watching the flimsy wooden door with contempt. A few seconds later, the lock clicked and her mother stuck her head in through the door, all smiles like she always was. Like all of her sisters, Mackenzie looked almost like a younger version of her mother: Long dark brown hair that was always kept back in a braid, a round face, a deep farmer's tan, and a wardrobe that consisted of nothing but conservative button up shirts and long denim skirts. The only differences were that she had inherited her father's brown eyes and long nose, her hair wasn't rapidly going grey, and her skin wasn't wrinkled from age and one too many sun burns.

"Mackenzie sweetie," Lisa chirped, the ends of her mouth stretching so far up her face that it seemed like two invisible hands were keeping them in place. "Your father would like to speak with you."

"I heard," Mackenzie grunted, hopping down from the chair and walking toward the door.

"Don't be like that," her mother said, her voice still lilting happily like it always did. "I'm sure it is just a simple mix-up." She wrung her hands. "Just a simple mix-up..."

The two walked through the house. The only sound that could be heard was their weight causing the wooden floorboards to creak. Perfectly understandable, it was an old house; the white paint on the walls was chipping in some places, the fringes on the walls were frayed and in need of repair, and in more than one place one could see the faded remnants of 'artwork' that one of the children had made on the walls. As they trekked down the stairs to the spacious living room, Mackenzie could hear the faint pop of one of the ovens' lighters and smell the garlicky scent of one of Martha's fish pies. Her empty stomach growled longingly. At least she had one thing to look forward to after getting yelled at. He wouldn't ground her for two days in a row without food, would he?

The living room, while spacious, was mostly empty space. A giant wooden crucifix took up the wall below the stairs, while a bookcase and an old wooden desk with an ancient computer took up another to its right. On the wall opposite of the stairs was an archway that lead into the dining room and kitchen, and the front door lead outside to the left of the staircase. Her father's favorite red velvet armchair sat against the bit of wall between the bookcase and the dining room arch with an end table holding a radio, a mason jar with a bunch of coins and pound notes stuffed in it, and the switch to the right of it. Her father, a very conservative looking man with slicked back brown hair, a strong jawline, and only a few wrinkles under his eyes, stared up at her angrily from the chair as she approached. On his lap was a pile of mail, and in one hand he held a brown envelope.

As they stepped off the steps, Lisa lightly grasped her daughter's shoulders and steered her in front of the chair. "I'm going to go help with dinner," she announced happily before she gave Mackenzie's shoulders a light squeeze and walked out.

"What is this?" Joseph asked curtly the instant Lisa was out of the room, holding up the brown envelope.

"A letter?" Mackenzie replied. For a second she worried about the question coming off as too sarcastic. But then she figured that there was no point in trying to speak to him 'correctly'. He would find some reason to discipline her if he really wanted to.

"Since when have you been sending letters to..." He glanced at the envelope. "'Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardr-' What is this blasphemy?! Is this one of your stupid jokes?!"

"No..." She furrowed her eyebrows. Even in her wildest dreams, she wouldn't have been able to think up such an elaborate practical joke, much less convince the postman to play along with it.

"Don't lie to me, girl," he growled. "I will not have any of this... this witchcraft _shit_ in my house." As he said this, he reached into one of his pockets and dropped a handful of change into the jar. The Swear Jar; the money in it was supposed to go to charity and away from the family, where it was often sorely needed, as punishment for foul language. The jar never seemed to empty, and her father was its biggest contributor. "'And Manasseh made his son pass through the fire, and observed times, and used enchantments, and dealt with familiar spirits and wizards: he wrought much wickedness in the sight of the Lord, to provoke him to anger.'" Mackenzie had long stopped wondering how her father was able to pull up a relevant Bible quote for any situation at a moment's notice. She swore she had copied the entire Bible at least five times over since she learned how to write and even she didn't have the whole thing memorized. Did he just spend every moment he was not at work reading it, or was he just making them up? "I don't know how you did it, but your name is on it. So I'm going to assume that you did it." He grasped the envelope in both hands and tore it in two. "You better pray that we don't get any more fake letters from this Hogmorts bullshit," more change for the jar, "cause I'm gonna give you the whoppin' of your life if I see them."

"Yes, sir," she said, pushing the words through her clenched teeth. If anyone in the family didn't answer him in that fashion, they got a switching.

"Are you giving me lip? I don't like the tone of your voice," he growled. "Get over here." And sometimes even then, they got one...

* * *

"I didn't even do anything!" Mackenzie was going to be spending the next day in her room copying more of the Bible for her 'prank'. What's worse, he made her skip dinner again. A real shame since Martha was the best cook in the house. (Even if she did have a thing for putting garlic in every savory dish that she made.) "This is such bullshit."

She had spent a few minutes lying on her bed, contemplating the wooden beams holding the mattress on the top bunk up, when someone knocked on the bedroom door. A few second later, Modesty pushed her way in, carrying a steaming plate of fish pie. Modesty, who was a year younger than Mackenzie, looked much the same as the rest of the girls, except she had inherited their mother's flat, wide nose. Behind her, Mackenzie could hear several footsteps going in different directions and the sounds of light conversation.

"Mum convinced Dad to let you have dinner," Modesty said as she sat the plate in front of her. The portions on it were small, but then again, that was how dinner usually was in the Campbell household. There were 18 mouths to feed and little money to do it with.

"Thanks," Mackenzie picked up the fork and slowly started to eat.

"I'll take it back down in the morning. Dad made us all go to our rooms after dinner. We're supposed to do our daily reflection by ourselves before we go to bed."

"Mmmhmm..."

She sat down on Mackenzie's bed. "Are you okay?"

"No."

"Do you want to talk about it?"

"No."

There was a long, awkward pause as Mackenzie ate and Modesty watched her, obviously trying to think of something to say that would make her feel better. Eventually, Modesty gave up and climbed up the ladder and into the top bunk. "I'll sneak some food up here tomorrow after lunch, if you want. I'll volunteer to help clean up again. Mordecai and Malachi will help me if I ask them to." Mordecai and Malachi were Modesty's buddies: 6-year-old identical twins who, despite living in a house that prized obedience and calm reflection from its children, were as rambunctious as any 6-year-old would be. They weren't punished nearly as much as Mackenzie and the girls were for their indiscretions. Something that Mackenzie had noticed a long time ago. When called out on it, their mother would explain that it was because they were younger and just didn't know better. Their father would spout some Bible verse that always boiled down to 'boys are better than girls' (in Mackenzie's mind anyway), and then switch them if he was in a foul mood.

"If you want... If you want to risk getting caught and Dad finding something in that stupid book that says that God hates people who feed people who are punished."

"Kenzie, don't say that."

"Fuck the Bible and fuck him!" Modesty let out an audible gasp. "Stop acting surprised, Dad says that word all the time."

"That doesn't mean we should say it."

"Oh, but Dad does because he's the head of the house, right?" Mackenzie tsked and returned her focus to her nearly empty plate.

"Things will get better," Modesty sighed, lying back on her bed. "God will provide."

Before Mackenzie could retaliate, Myra and Mara, their roommates, burst into the room. Identical twins like Mordecai and Malachi, they each sported their mother's blue eyes and flat nose. Their braids only went down to their shoulder blades.

"Mum's a witch!" Myra announced.

"Don't say things like that about Mum," Modesty said.

"It's true! We heard Dad yelling at her for being one!"

"We stayed back on the steps after dinner and listened to them," Mara said.

"Yeah," Myra continued, nodding. "He was all 'why is that devil school sending letters to Mackenzie?! I thought you stopped talking to those heathens years ago! You destroyed that wand, right?! Did you tell her anything?! What did you tell her?!' Rah rah rah!" She flailed her arms about as if she were a rampaging dinosaur. "He always mad at something. If he doesn't stop, he's going to get a... What was that thing called, Mara? Where your heart gets clogged?"

"A heart attack?"

"Yeah, that's it!" It was a wonder to Mackenzie how her younger sisters managed to stay cheerful despite their bad home life. With the twins she assumed that it was because they were younger. Though the one time when she asked Modesty, she said that she put her faith in God.

Right, because God came down and told their father to stop hitting her.

Of course, them not having, if Myra and Mara were to be believed, magic powers that went off at random probably helped too.

"Why would he yell at Mum?" Modesty asked. "When he was yelling at Kenzie, he said that it was a prank. Besides, pagans don't have schools like we do." She leaned over the guard rail on her bunk. "Kenzie, you didn't write that letter, did you?"

"No!" She snapped. "Do you think I enjoy getting yelled at? And do you really think the postman would've played along with it?"

"Probably not," Myra said. "He told on us when we left Malachi's rubber snake in the post box."

"We shouldn't've stayed in the bushes and watched," Mara said with a frown.

"Yeah well, there you go," Mackenzie said. "And he's obviously just blaming Mum for it because he's a massive git. I mean, does she seriously seem like someone who would be a witch?" The twins shook their heads.

"Kenzie, you should go to bed," Modesty said. "If anyone asks, I'll say that you looked through Proverbs and reflected on that. You'll probably feel better in the morning."

"Yeah yeah," she stood up, stretched, and rubbed her wrists. "I got all the way to Leviticus today. I don't see the point in copying all of this stuff. I'm not learning anything from it." She pulled the blankets on her bed back and climbed into it.

"I don't either," Modesty said, tucking herself in. Mara climbing into the other bottom bunk as Myra started up the ladder to the top. A second later, Modesty reached over and pulled the chain on the ceiling fan, switching the light off.

"I hope this doesn't happen tomorrow," Myra added. "I hate early bedtimes."

Mackenzie drifted off to sleep to the faint sounds of her sisters praying.

* * *

Several days later, sometime around 4 pm, a car drove up the long dirt road that served as the Campbell's driveway. It was an old car: a lime green and rust speckled Ford Prefect that looked like it had rolled sputtering and wheezing out of the 60s. Mackenzie was the first one to see it, as she was doing a diagram sketch of some of the herbs in the kitchen window for school while watching Moses and Madeline play in their playpen. As she watched, a short, slightly pudgy looking man with brown hair and a round face on the passenger side got out and started up towards the porch. Eventually, he disappeared from sight and the door bell rang.

"Coming!" Her mother trilled from the living room. Mackenzie returned to her drawing. It was probably someone from the government or a church official.

"Hello!" Mackenzie could imagine her mother opening the door, her obnoxious fake smile stretching from ear to ear.

"Lisa Campbell?"

"I prefer Mrs. Joseph Campbell, but yes?"

"My name is Neville Longbottom. I'm the professor of Herbology at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry."


End file.
